The Deep End
by hallonim
Summary: A story about how things are not as easy as they could be. Tim/Raylan slash.


**Title:** The Deep End

**Disclaimer:** I own nothing. This is just for fun.

**Rating:** M. For language and… stuff.

**Summary:** This story takes place shortly after my previous one; _'The Edge'._ It's Tim/Raylan slash of the continuously melodramatic variety.

**Author´s note:** First off - a big thank you to freshouttaideas, for the lovely (and extremely helpful) exchange of ideas!

I was _so_ planning to post this in chapters… but my lazy side got the better of me, so this is the whole thing in one go. A healthy dose of suspension of disbelief might be needed.

* * *

It's the middle of the night on a Thursday when his phone rings. Tim's first instinct is dread, a tiresome result of work related paranoia, but he knows what it's about the moment he sees the caller ID. It's Lindsey. He should be resigned to this by now, but worry worms its way into his sleep-muddled mind anyway. He's kind of pissed too, so much he even considers not picking up. It doesn't seem fair to her though. His voice sounds like gravel.

"Yeah…"

"Hey, Tim…"

"He okay?"

"No worse than usual. Be nice if you could head on over here though…"

She's a great bartender. And she's got that naturally unwavering tone, all action and no bullshit. Tim likes her.

"I'll be right there. Hey Lindsey…"

"What?"

"Thanks."

"Just get your butt over here, honey. I'm too tired for this shit."

The fight's long since been lost when he gets there, no more than twenty minutes later. The bar is closed and the lights outside are off, but the door isn't locked yet. Raylan is sitting on the floor by the pool table, bleeding from his mouth and knuckles and clearly drunk off his ass. Tim crouches down by his side, feels his head for bumps or cuts and checks to make sure his ribs are whole. There's a boot shaped bruise dangerously close to his kidney, he'll have to make sure he's not pissing blood then. Good times. Raylan is blinking up at him, all owl eyes and sway. He's smiling, Tim is not smiling back.

"'Bout time you got here Timmy… I was… well, _winning _and then these two Al… Alba… Aaalabama accent fuckers come n' start shit up. I dunno… M'sorry, Tim… sorry."

"I know."

He looks up to see Lindsey looking smugly sympathetic at his side. Her hair is escaping her ponytail. It must have been a long night. He sort of wants to tell her that out of the people Raylan's slept with, that he's met, she's his favorite. He doesn't though. He just gives her a grateful nod and half a smile, says "I've got him now, you can go home."

She squeezes his shoulder for a second. "He's lucky to have you, Tim. You should make sure he knows that."

Tim snorts. _Lucky_ is not a word he'd use for either one of them. "I think we deserve each other."

She gives him a look he can't read. "Come down for coffee tomorrow?"

"Sure."

The apartment smells stuffy and unused. It looks unused too, Raylan barely keeps a change of clothes here anymore. He's a really heavy drunk. Tim drags him to the bed, gets his shoes and shirt off and goes looking for rubbing alcohol and ice. He finds plenty, moving over to kneel by the bedside. He washes the blood from his face, gentle, letting reddish water run down his neck and into his hair, dampening the sheet. Raylan is uncharacteristically silent. He hisses at the disinfectant and mumbles a curse at the feel of ice, but none of his usual alcohol-infused chatter. He'd gone to see Arlo at the prison today. Tim thinks about what that means. He knows, on a very basic and personal level, the impulse that Raylan is battling. He's mostly numb to it now, but if he lets it… it'll echo through his entire body, like electricity. It's made wholly out of pain, out of the ugly history that's etched all the way into his bones and he hates it. It's hard not to dwell though, nights like this.

Raylan's looking at him. His left eye will be bruised by tomorrow. "I don't know why I get like this." He whispers, sounding like broken glass. Tim could cut himself open on it. He kind of wants to. He wants to pull Raylan in and hold him close enough to hurt. They could bleed out together.

"Sure you do," he says instead.

Raylan barks out a devastatingly false laugh. Shakes his head. Tim strokes some left over drops of water from his face and runs a hand through his wet hair, leaves it resting on his forehead.

"You do it… cause getting beat up is the only way you feel close to him."

"Yeah well, seein' the man himself is just always such a fuckin' disappointment."

His eyes slip shut while he's talking, breathing evening out into sleep seconds later. Tim kneels on the floor by his side for the longest time and just_ looks_. For better or worse, seeking out battles has made him who he 's the most fundamental part of him, the part that_ craves_ violence, that sniffs out danger like a shark would a trail of blood. It's one of the reasons he became a soldier, his deepest and most repressed motivation for joining the Marshals Service and it's probably why he fell so hard for Raylan to begin with. It's the part where the two of them are exactly alike. Tim thinks, with a painful lump caught in his throat, that they won't make it. That they'll end up destroying each other in the crossfire**.** He thinks that maybe they should end it before that can happen. It's a devastating realization. He crawls into bed when it's almost dawn and stares up at the water stained ceiling until his wristwatch tells him it's six thirty.

* * *

The pain in his side registers first. The hangover comes next, followed closely by the busted up face. Raylan groans, covers his eyes against the sunlight seeping through the blinds, find his right hand swollen and sore. A fight then. Heforces one eye open. He's in his apartment at the bar and _why the hell is that? _He tries to think backward, gets a blurry image of Tim, still in his boots, on the bed next to him. Tim is not here now. There's a full glass of water on the bedside table though, and some aspirin in a jar. He struggles to sit up and gets it semi-right on the third try. A couple of pills and half a glass later he remembers going to see Arlo. Then he remembers deciding to get a drink. Well, shit.

Lindsey is going through receipts downstairs, sitting alone by the counter. She smiles at him as he limps over, an edge of pity laced with scorn detectable somewhere between her eyebrows.

"You gonna call in sick?"

"Seems like the appropriate thing to do…"

She slides a cup of coffee in his direction, lukewarm, and leans forward on her elbows like she does when she means business.

"Tim just left for work."

"Yeah well, he is neurotically early… and tidy too. Tidy Tim."

"I don't think he's mad at you, Raylan. Even though he sure as hell should be…"

He looks at her chapstick shiny mouth to avoid her eyes. She's the only one who knows what's really going on with him and Tim. She's known since the start, when they'd stumble upstairs, giddy and drunk and hands all over each other. Most days, it's nice to have someone know the truth, to not have to hide everything away all the time. It's nice to be _seen_. Today though, Raylan would rather just crawl into a dark corner and _not deal_. She stares him down for a bit, looking for an admission of guilt, he's sure, but she gives up even before he's finished the coffee, shakes her blond curls and goes back to the receipts. He leans over the counter to kiss her cheek quickly before stumbling back upstairs.

The house is dark when he gets there; he slept most of the day away. Tim's sitting in his preferred corner of the porch. There's something uncomfortable stirring the air between them, Raylan can't quite put his finger on it, until Tim starts to speak.

"I miss it sometimes."

"What?"

"War."

He looks out across the lawn, sunset coloring it dramatically orange.

"It's fucking horrible. I did horrible things, I lost a lot of friends and I came back all busted to hell, in every way I wasn't before… But I needed it too. I was good at it. It made some things simple."

Raylan squints at the red sun, pulse speeding up a notch. This is not gonna be another war-story. He's not sure he's ready for this. Tim sounds far away, Raylan forces himself to look at him**, **lit upin fire-orange and soot black shadows.

"I think he blamed me for my mom leaving. It's such a goddamn cliché. He gets stuck with a kid he doesn't want and makes him pay for it."

"Tim… you don't have to."

"Yeah, I do."

He takes a couple of seconds, a few deep breaths. "Everyone liked him. The people he worked with, our neighbors… he was always all polite and _such a good man_, taking care of his son on his own… He would…"

The pause is so long and vividly silent, Raylan is shaking apart at the seams. He's too tired and too hung over and where the hell did this conversation even _come from_? Why now? Tim clears his throat, keeps looking out at the grass.

"When he would hurt me, there was always this look on his face… like… _hate_… but pleasure too, you know? It wasn't even punishment, most of the time, just… random. He could be making me breakfast before school and then push me down in the hallway on my way out and use the belt so hard I'd have to stay home. When it got really bad, he'd tie my hands, use something that would leave a scar. The cigarette burns… they're from maybe… four or five separate times."

Tim tells it like it's someone else's story. Like he's disconnected from it, locked away in some cold and distant place. It makes Raylan sick. He's so angry his vision blurs with black spots. Angry at Tim's father for hurting him, angry at Tim for not responding the way he should, angry at himself for handling it so fucking bad.

"Raylan? Hey… you okay?"

He flinches. Stares at Tim who stares back, only more at the brick wall behind Raylan than actually _at_ him. Had he heard that right? "What?"

"I've dealt with this shit, you know? I'm mostly alright with it now. I just… I figured you should know... "

Tim is not _mostly alright_. Raylan has seen, up close and personal, how not alright he can be, thrashing like he's possessed, unable to wake up from the memories. He pushes his thumb and index finger into his eyes and wishes that he had prepared himself better for this. He had known it was coming, he'd just seen it play out differently in his head. He'd imagined something sad and teary, definitely uncomfortable, but in a completely different way… and now he has no clue what to say. His knuckles are ghost-white on the armrest. He'd not imagined Tim anything like this; icy and distant, voice flat as if he's reciting the fucking phone book.

"When I left… I had nothing. Going to war felt… right, I guess. It made sense to me. I was always prepared for the worst… even when it was slow and boring, I was expecting shit to blow up in my face. I felt at home that way. Guess I owe him that, huh?"

Raylan snorts, jaw clenched so tight his teeth hurt. He has to force himself to speak, surprised at how soft he sounds. "You're not alright, Tim… those dreams, the bad ones…"

"Happens what… like… twice a year? It's fine. I'm not angry at him anymore."

"Bullshit you're not."

"What are you gonna do about it then? Huh, Raylan? There's nothing anyone can do to change the shit that's already happened. We just have to live with it."

"Can you do that though? I mean _really_… "

Tim turns to look at him, right at him this time, face still agonizingly dispassionate even as the challenge is blatantly obvious.

"Can you?"

There's nothing he can say to that so he snaps his mouth shut and looks away. Tim heads back inside, clearly not expecting an answer. He's still lost as to where this came from. Things have been fine, generally speaking anyway, so he can't for the life of him figure out why Tim's suddenly all odd and_ sharing_. Raylan doesn't fall asleep that night. He keeps waiting for Tim to slip into some kind of a violent nightmare and feels like a traitor when he's sort of disappointed that it doesn't happen.

He's on the I-64 driving east from Louisville to Lexington few days later, miles over the speed limit, anger still simmering just below the surface. Tim's still on some kind of mental lock down, avoiding him most of the time. Actually, they might be avoiding each other. He has no idea how to fix it, how to deal with Tim like this or even how to _reach _him. It's exhausting. The road starts to blur at the horizon, dusk dulling down his vision but he does not want to slow down. He wants a drink.

It's amazing how easy it is to erase all the worries of the world. It tastes good too. He's trying to read the spinning label of the bottle in front of him, finding it both funny and useless. Lindsey's looking scared only that can't be right 'cause she only ever does annoyed or resolute. Or _hot_. He smirks at that. Then suddenly, Tim's there. Raylan can't read the expression on his face, he thinks it might be sadness. Then he thinks he might have gotten that one wrong too, when Tim pushes the palms of his hands into Raylan's chest _hard_, sending him stumbling into the counter with a painful thump. It pisses him off.

"You wanna fight, huh?" Tim says. "Then you fight me, Raylan. You fight _me_ this time."

"Fuck off, Tim."

"No."

"I said… _fuck off_."

"I said _no_."

He's watching it all happen through a shade of furious, blistering red. Thinks he hears Arlo laughing somewhere close by as he aligns his body into a familiar stance, fist following the twist of his hip real easy and punches Tim right in the face, not holding back even a little bit. Tim doesn't make any attempt to block it. There's a snap as Raylan's fist connects, then Tim is smiling, red-teethed and manic, spitting blood on the floor.

"Come on…" he hisses "do it again, you know you want to."

Raylan stumbles back pathetically, makes it up the stairs and to the bathroom before throwing up, bourbon burning his throat like acid. He doesn't know how long he stays there, bent over the sink, avoiding the mirror, but he feels completely sober when he walks back out. Tim's sitting by the window, streetlight and neon painting his face icy blue.

"We'll hurt each other too bad." He says it like it's the last thing he'll ever say. There are tears dripping down his chin and the tip of his nose. Raylan's never seen him cry except for when he's half asleep, caught in the horrors of a nightmare. The weight of it hits him now and it breaks his heart. He wants to touch him, wants to kiss him better where he's hurt, _where Raylan's hurt him_, but it doesn't feel like he's allowed to do that anymore. He doesn't look up as Tim leaves, doesn't hear the door close behind him and doesn't remember going to bed or falling asleep. He calls in sick for a week.

It's beyond awkward, spending time at the office when he gets back. They don't talk, at least not about anything that matters. It's like living in a mine-field**.** Raylan spends a lot of time in Harlan, hides out a couple of days in the surveillance van and two weeks pass like pieces of a puzzle that don't fit, fragmented and stupid and plain sad.

The bar never felt like home. It's empty and bleak and it just… it smells wrong. Raylan sits at one of the corner tables with a glass of whiskey, still full, clasped between his hands. He's been doing this every night. Coming down here and telling Lindsey to pour him a drink which he then proceeds to stare into, eventually leaving it untouched. It'd be so easy to give in to it. Fall into mist and wake up bloody and numb, but he won't. Lindsey doesn't say anything but he catches her tantalizing eyes on him from time to time. She's angry or disappointed… or _something_. He's not sure what. He's wallowing here, he knows, torturing himself and it's no more than he deserves. He was supposed to figure things out and instead he somehow managed to fuck it up completely. Or maybe it was doomed from the get go, he and Tim were always too different… or too much alike; either way would fit. He rubs at his face tiredly**. **Maybe the reason he couldn't deal with Tim's shit, was that he didn't want to face his own. He thinks that's really freakin' depressing and then he thinks about that night on the porch, Tim's voice all dead and flat as he talked about his dad. Thinks about him smooth and focused behind a rifle, lethal and calm as can be. Or angry, eyes relentless and dangerous, body tense on the verge of attack. Exaggeratingly annoyed and bored behind his desk 'cause he's pretending to hate paperwork. At ease and smiling in the kitchen, chopping onions and humming to himself. Falling asleep with his head on Raylan's chest 'cause he can't ever stay awake for a whole movie after ten. Spread out across the bed, naked and more beautiful with all his scars and flaws than _anyone's _ever been before… Yeah, they should never have given it up so easy. He stares into the glass; it's like an abyss, staring right back.

A handful of ill-advised incidents run through his mind when Art waves him into his office on Monday morning and closes the door. But it's been a slow couple of weeks, and he is at the very least moderately sure that he hasn't done anything that would require this amount of serious wrinkles on the Chief Deputy's forehead. He scratches his stubble. Maybe the thing with that Harris asshole and the cocaine? But Art didn't know about that, did he? His voice is strained and awkward in a way it usually isn't.

"Don't sit down."

Raylan doesn't, he does take his hat off and puts on his apologetic face in advance. His boss does not keep him waiting for long.

"You're gonna have to fix this thing, whatever it is, with Tim."

Oh hell. Of all the things he didn't expect… this is the fucking worst. He moves his weight back and forth a bit, considers making a run for it even though that would just not look good at all. He sure as hell isn't ashamed of _anything _he's ever had with Tim, but this is outside of them, this is work and out in the open and _dangerous._ His voice breaks.

"Art… it's not…"

"No, don't. Don't tell me about it, I don't wanna know. I want you to fix it."

Raylan stares at his hands, twitchingly squeezing his hat. He has no idea what to say. Art takes a sip from his coffee, sighs dramatically loud and runs a hand down his face.

"Alright, listen real careful 'cause I'm only gonna say this once. I am not stupid. I notice things. You and Tim…" He stops, rubs his bald head, looks out the window for a distressingly long timeand sits down behind his desk. "Ah, fuckin' hell Raylan."

Raylan sort of sinks down into the chair, slouching like a drunk man. He's got nothing. No defense strategy or smartass comeback. Not even a lie. Art won't be able to wait him out on this one. He still gives it a good, long try. Something like a whole minute ticks by, emphasized by the roaring office background noise; phones ringing, copy machine beeping, the echo of footsteps, buzz of voices…

"Alright, I get it. We're not gonna talk about this… and up until very recently you've both been doing your jobs as well as you normally do. However, if you're gonna end up skulking around the office like a pair of stray cats in a rainstorm then it'll turn into a problem for me. You understand?"

Raylan bites a nail and stares into the wall. Blinks a few times because his eyes sting a bit… Oh, was he supposed to say something? He glances over at Art who gawks back expectantly before huffing in his most annoyed manner.

"_Dammit… _As it is right now, I can't rely on you to be able to work together. So… You set things right or I'll get the papers in order to have one of you transferred."

The thought of that is insane but putting all of it into words is hard, way harder than it should be. Raylan feels like a kid and he was not a particularly happy kid. "I don't know how," he tells the floor.

Art leans back in his chair and puts his arms behind his head, looking at him like he's an idiot.

"Raylan, you're two healthy and able, grown up men. You're both capable of coherent thought and speech. _Talk to each other_, for the love of Christ."

He leaves the office in a mild state of shellshock, not entirely sure what the hell just happened. He looks over at Tim's desk. It's empty. Art is right, this won't do, with them sneaking around pretending the_ life_ they had together didn't happen. Bailing like cowards from something that was never easy but so fucking _good _it was worth every minute of it. Raylan smoothes his hair back and puts his hat back , he really is an idiot.

* * *

The rifle feels like a part of his body. Tim's lying on a balcony across from a shitty looking building with a liquor store on the ground floor, where two gorilla-masked morons have got five hostages lined up against a wall. One of them is supposedly Andy Watkins; a smalltime drug dealer currently trying to run from a five year prison sentence, who he and Rachel have been tracking for the better part of a week. He's not sure who the other one is. Rachel is down on the street, no doubt giving the hostage negotiator and local SWAT team leader a hard time. Gorilla number one is stuffing cash and cigarettes into a duffle. The second one is sliding up behind one of the girls, running the blunt end of a knife along the side of her face. It doesn't draw any blood. She's sobbing, perched awkwardly on one high heeled shoe. Tim breathes steady. The weather's clear and crisp, hardly any wind. It's a good day to shoot someone.

He struggles to keep focus though. He hasn't been sleeping well, not because of nightmares or memories, but because he's just not used to falling asleep alone anymore. Raylan is like a huge gap inside him. He hates it. He wants to say he's sorry. That he screwed up, got scared and ran. He's never had to run before, because everyone he's ever been with has beaten him to it. He represses a snort. Everyone in his long line of easy hookups… too easy, most of the time. He figures it's 'cause he's got that detached edge, sharp enough to kill. Slender and boyish with murder in his eyes. It makes him feel dangerous and people like that. Or, people want to fuck that, more like. Want intimacy in the same way a fight is intimate. In the way it's a struggle, a strain for power. The rifle is cold against his cheek._ Intimate_ like killing someone from up close, he thinks; _neck caught in a chokehold, slick with sweat, eyes rolling back, mouth open and gasping, saliva trickling down into the crook of his elbow._ Tim shudders, forces himself out of it before the smooth concrete he's lying on starts to feel like hot sand and the air starts to smell of poppy fields and fire instead of cool Kentucky autumn.

The gorillas are getting worked up, pacing like cornered animals would, probably realizing that the store doesn't have a back door. Rachel's upset too and Tim knows why. He has met the local SWAT team and they're no fun at all. He blinks a couple of times, licks his lips, thinks that at this point, shit can end either way.

The thing about the hookups is that… it was never really Tim's thing. He did it 'cause he could, 'cause that's what he thought he was supposed to want. It wasn't all bad but looking back at it, it feels pointless. Tim hadn't been worth sticking around with for the complicated aftermath. Raylan was different. He wasn't afraid of all the mundane, emotionally stunted bullshit. He'd seen something Tim had long since buried and split him open, like an Aztec sacrifice, left him lying in a messy heap with ribs splayed in every which direction, blood pouring out in rivulets and his heart on open display. All his broken pieces, all the pain and the shame and guilt had spilled out like slippery entrails, but he'd found something _good_ too. Something he'd forgotten that he could be. More than an exciting fuck, more than an Army Ranger sniper and a Deputy Marshal. Someone honest and vulnerable. Someone who'd worry and care, wanting intimacy in the way that love is intimate.

There's a distant crash as one of the gorillas hurls a bottle of booze out through a window and turns toward the first hostage in line, grabs her by the hair and presses the knife to her throat, the sharp end, this time. 'Green light' buzzes through his earpiece. Tim pulls the trigger.

Watkins is crying as the police escort him past his dead companion, his gorilla mask caught in the collar of his torn up jacket. He looks pitiable now and Tim has to suppress a sudden and powerful wave of sympathy. Back at the office, he spends hours going through paperwork. He's meticulous, forces all of his attention into detail, fingers stained with red marker ink. Raylan's desk is gapingly empty but he refuses to let it distract him. It takes Rachel almost a whole minute to announce her presence, looming over him with her arms crossed and her eyes set. She takes him out for coffee, the good, expensive stuff, her treat. She eyes him carefully, he tries to look comfortable.

"Are you okay?"

"Yes."

"Are you sure? You did just kill a man, you know."

"I noticed. And yeah, I'm alright."

Rachel leans forward, puts her cup down. It's really hard to avoid eye contact. Tim runs a hand through his hair a couple of times.

"I should slap you."

"For what?"

"For finding killing so freaking easy."

"Did you want me to _spare_ the gorilla?"

His name had been Donny Connell. Watkins's best friend since preschool, their moms worked at the same restaurant. He had been in and out of rehab or jail since he was a kid. His 22nd birthday had been three days ago. Tim still has the files on him on his desk. Rachel sighs and shakes her head, picking a couple of sunflower seeds from her bagel and piling them neatly on the table.

"No. That's not what I mean."

"Oh, okay. You want me to cry about it."

"Christ Tim, I want you to _feel_ it. I mean… don't you?"

She's sincere, barely even blinking. He's about to go for a snarky comeback 'cause it's the only road he can see that might lead him out of this mess, but she catches it before it's converted from thought to sound and refuses to drop the look she's fixed him with. He breaks… and it must show because her face softens.

"I don't get to flinch doing this, Rachel. It might be… cold, but it has to be. Imagine me running around with a rifle basing my decisions to shoot on anger or fear. Or what if I had hesitated today? That girl might have been dead instead of Connell… So pulling the trigger has to be separate from what _I _feel… and it's _hard_ to do that. Sometimes, I guess maybe most times… that distance sort of sticks with me. Doesn't mean that it's ever easy, or that I don't know what I've done. Doesn't mean I don't… own it."

"So when you worry that what you're feeling is going to lead you to make the wrong decisions, you wall it off?"

"I guess…"

"Is that why you screwed things up with Raylan?"

He chokes on his coffee, coughs into the crook of his elbow knowing the embarrassing shade of red his face must be right now. Rachel figured them out almost before they did, he knows that. They're not supposed to talk about it though. She's hiding a smile behind her coffee cup, Tim stares down into his.

"Might have been part of it…"

"You're an idiot."

"I know."

A lamp is switched on in his house as he gets home. It's not the way he left it. He pulls his gun from its holster before sneaking in quiet, on alert now, small surge of adrenaline making his fingertips cold. He makes sure the hallway and living room are clear before moving towards the kitchen. There's a slight draft, so the back door must be open. He sees Raylan's hat, hanging off the railing, the second he steps out on the porch, Glock still raised and ready. The man himself is lounging sluggishly in Tim's favorite chair, a cooler filled with beer sitting by his socked feet, two bottles already empty. He quirks an eyebrow.

"You gonna arrest me?"

"I don't know. Do you plan on paying for that beer, or are you robbing me?"

He removes the clip and puts the gun on the windowsill behind him. Raylan hands him an open bottle, he takes a small sip and sits down, ridiculously cautious. It's familiar and strange at the same time**. **Tim's confused… and nervous. Fiddling stupidly with the moist label on the bottle. He did not expect this, not in a million motherfucking years.** "**Where's your car?" he asks, 'cause the air is so thick and loaded, he's starting to panic. Raylan doesn't reply. He looks up at the sky, then down at his feet, worry lines etched deep into his brow.

"I'm sorry I hit you," he says.

Tim swallows thickly. "I wanted you to."

"I know, scares the shit out of me."

"It should."

It takes time after that. Neither of them knows what to say, how to say it. Tim struggles to put his thoughts into words, like he kinda always has. He thinks he should tell Raylan that he'd wanted to prove a point, and that all his predictions fell into place exactly as he thought they would. That they're two destructive forces, both born from violence and fear, that'll ultimately and unavoidably end up in a collision course and crash. Raylan's voice surprises him out of his thoughts, his words slow and honest.

"I love you, you know. A lot. Maybe more than anything."

Tim's stomach flips. This is it, the crossroads. He could tap out here, he knows. Finish what he started that night at the bar and walk away for good. Go back to cold and efficient and _easy_. Or he could jump in at the deep end and hope they don't drag each other down. He takes a slow breath, closes his eyes. Turns out, it's not a hard choice to make.

"I love you too. And I missed you… shit,_ Raylan_… so much."

Raylan looks at him, right at him, like it's a test. It doesn't last long, a few seconds at the most, then his face splits into a crooked grin, he runs a smooth hand across the table and pops another bottle open, says, "Did you shoot a gorilla today?"

Tim nods, just once, because he doesn't know what else to do. It's too early to feel the relief he knows is coming. Too fragile to just walk on over and pull Raylan in close, the way he sort of wants to. They stay on the porch until the sun's set and it's almost all the way dark, nothing but empty beer bottles and easy silence between them.

Later**, **so late they can pretend there's no one but them left in the world, Raylan kisses him down his belly to his hip, sucks a mark into it. He lifts Tim's leg up a bit, breathes all warm and slow over the burns on his thigh before kissing them softly, so fucking tender and Tim can't breathe. It hurts in such a good way he's losing his mind with it**. **He thinks, for the first time, that maybe they really are lucky. Maybe all that history they've got won't destroy them at all. Maybe it'll be what saves them.


End file.
